The Court of Appeal in Abuja, on Friday, adjourned indefinitely proceedings in the appeal filed by the National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Adams Oshiomhole, challenging his suspension from office.
The appellate court had on Monday (March 16) stayed the execution of the ruling of an FCT High Court suspending him from the party.
A three-man panel of the court led by Justice Abubakar Yahaya ordered a stay of execution and consequently, restrained the respondents in the appeal from proceeding to act or take any further steps with regards to the ruling of the lower court.
The court ruled that the order would remain binding pending the hearing of Oshiomhole’s motion for interlocutory injunction slated for Friday.
The panel also unanimously restrained the respondents including the Police and the Department of State Services from further giving effect to the suspension order.
When the matter came up on Friday, a clerk of the court announced that there would not be able to sit and that a new date will be communicated to the parties.
Justice Danlami Senchi of an Abuja High Court had in an interlocutory ruling on March 4, 2020, ordered among others, that Oshiomhole should desist from parading himself as the APC Chairman.
The order was a sequel to an application of interlocutory injunction asking the court to suspend Oshiomhole, having been suspended as a member of the APC by the party in Edo State.
However, Oshiomole through his lawyer, Mr Damian Dodo, SAN, had same day approached the appellate court to reverse the suspension order placed on him by the lower court.
He specifically asked the Court of Appeal to set aside the suspension order of Justice Senchi and restore his position as National Chairman of the APC.
In his appeal predicated on four grounds, Oshiomhole argued that the judge erred in law and arrived at a wrong conclusion which occasioned a miscarriage of justice when the court placed him on suspension at an interlocutory stage of a suit instituted against him by some aggrieved members of the party.
He also argued that the High Court further erred in law when it decided that he, in the performance of his duties as APC National Chairman, would interfere in the court action filed against him by the aggrieved members.
He argued that the issue of duties as APC National Chairman is a matter which arose from substantive issues for determination.
He also claimed that this ought not to have been determined at the interlocutory stage of the main matter.